49 Leti
Leti
No one ever talks about how hard it is to craft a grand gesture when your dominant arm is broken.
Or how difficult it is to hide said grand gesture from your boyfriend who hovers. I like the sound of that, though. Boyfriend. Partner. It’s not nearly as hard to get used to as I thought it’d be.
Bella is at Luis’s with Mari, which means Julian and I have the apartment to ourselves tonight.
He walks right in at seven on the dot, the time I asked him to come over, and his eyes scan the place in awe.
The back wall in the living room is covered in the printouts and notes he made when we started this bonkers dating scheme of ours—only now I’ve written over every page in huge, block letters that ask him a very important question.
JULIAN, WILL YOU BE MY BOYFRIEND?
I’ve been sweating all day, first from nerves, then from the physical exertion of putting up the wall even with help from Bella and Elena, then from nerves again.
It’s all compounded by his arrival, at the way he’s staring up at my creation as his eyes mist over with tears. I only hope they’re good tears.
“What’s all this?” Slowly, he approaches the wall.
At the top corner is the only page not marked out with a letter in Sharpie.
It’s his dating profile from the app we matched on, his picture circled in red marker accompanied by my annotations.
He lifts onto his toes and snatches the page for a better look.
I’ve gone over the page a hundred times but still read it over his shoulder.
Julian Gutierrez, 24
High school history teacher
who knew we’d end up working at the same school?
4 miles away
more like 0. This app is broken.
We’ll get along if…
You know how to banter
The biggest risk I’ve taken is…
Is it cheesy if I say joining this app? No, yeah, that’s way too cheesy. Um, let’s see, uh…I’ll come back to this question when I think of something better.
Wow, that was rough getting through a second time. What did I ever see in you?
This year I want to…
Find the love of my life.
In that case, I have some very good news for you…
“Leticia?” He turns back to me, twin dimples on either cheek making an appearance as his grin spreads. “Explain, please.”
“Was the question behind me not clear enough?”
“I’m already your boyfriend,” he reminds me. “Why are you asking?”
“Because I don’t want to date you exclusively anymore,” I say. “I want the whole thing. Commitment. Working through the hard stuff together. That, and I love you. According to Marcela and Angela, grand gestures come with the territory when you’re hopelessly in love.”
“You love me?” That smile somehow spreads even wider. He steps back from me and unbuttons his shirt. “Well, I’ll be damned.”
“What are you doing? Are we going straight to the I love you sex?” I make a show of shrugging and blow out a resigned breath as I lift up my shirt. “If you insist. But we probably shouldn’t ruin another couch, so let’s go to my room and—”
“This isn’t a sex thing,” he says, tugging down my shirt before holding out his right forearm to me.
He has new tattoos on the underside of his arm I haven’t seen yet.
They’re nothing special, just a series of numbers tattooed in a simple font in black ink, except for the third date, which is in red ink.
The significance doesn’t hit me until I realize they’re dates.
4.10.21
8.9.25
10.16.25
11.6.25
“First, second, and third first date.”
I suck in a breath, but it’s a struggle when the wind has been knocked out of me. “Plus October sixteenth. The night of your concussion.” A cross between a sob and a laugh leaves my mouth. “This is gonna make celebrating our anniversary kind of hard, don’t you think?”
“I figured October sixteenth will be our anniversary since that’s when we unofficially got together, but we’ll have some fun extra dates to celebrate on in case you forget.
I know your memory is no good, and I’m anticipating it’ll only get worse as you get older.
” He plants a kiss on my lips when I scoff at him. “How does that sound?”
“Sounds like a plan.” I smile. “When did you get these?”
“After we got into that stupid fight about your brother. The first one,” he says.
“I would’ve shown you sooner, but I wanted to wait until we were on better terms. It’s not the only one I have.
” He turns his arm over, revealing his ring finger with the perfect circle that is now accompanied by straight lines to indicate sun rays.
“A sun for my sunshine boy.” I bring his hand to my lips, kissing his ring finger.
“It wasn’t a sun until you made it one.” My brows crease as I stare at him. “It was originally supposed to represent life coming full circle.”
“Sorta like us,” I tell him, and he takes in a deep breath.
“You have no idea,” he says. “But it means something else now. My mom once said she couldn’t wait for me to find my person, the one who’ll look at me and see the sun.”
He moves the side of his unbuttoned shirt away and places my left hand on his bare chest over his heart.
Tenderly, he moves it down until my index finger lands on a tattoo I’ve never noticed before.
I must’ve seen Julian shirtless hundreds of times, and somehow missed this one.
It’s much smaller than the others around it.
Easy to overlook unless you know what you’re searching for.
Two words that let loose a gasp from my lips.
Sunshine boy.
“You call me your sun, but I’m the one orbiting around you, Leticia,” he says. “Always have, always will.”
“How dare you.” Tears prick my eyes as I read the words over and over, as if that will possibly change their meaning.
“Tonight was supposed to be about my grand gesture. How dare you one-up me like this.” I try for a dry chuckle, but it comes out wet and choked.
His hand cups my cheek as the tears spill over.
“How long have you had this one, Julian?” I meet his gaze, staring into those deep brown eyes swimming in emotion. “How long?”
“After the second time you said it, I think,” he finally says after what feels like a long, agonizing moment of silence.
“The day I told your brother I was in love with you for the first time. Not that he knew I was talking about you.” He shakes his head.
“I wanted to kill him when he nearly spilled the beans at his birthday party. It would’ve been way too soon for you to know how I felt. ”
“You’ve really loved me for that long?” I ask.
“I mean, I know now there was never anyone else. It took a while for me to come around to Bella and Elena’s theory, that I’m the one you were telling my brother about all this time.
I only started to believe it after our first third date, but—” You have always been my number one, Leticia. “I still can’t wrap my head around it.”
“I’ve been waiting my entire life to love you, Leticia. Or four long years, at the very least.”
“You barely knew me back then.”
“Maybe.” He beams. “But I knew enough to change that for good, didn’t I?”
He did. And even though I fought against him every step of the way at first, now I wouldn’t have it any other way.
“I love you too, Leticia,” he says. “More than you will ever know.”
I’m not so sure of that anymore. Now that I’m no longer oblivious, it’s hard to understand how I couldn’t see what was right in front of me this entire time. Then again, I’m stubborn. I always knew I’d be a hard person to love.
But Julian loves me anyway.
He loves me like it’s easy. Like I’m not hardheaded and stubborn and endlessly frustrating. He’s everything I’ve ever wanted in a partner and more. So much more.
“I know, Julian,” I tell him. “It may have taken me a while to figure it out, but I know.”
And I’m never going back.